Well hello there!

My goodness!
There is a blog under all that dust. Who'd have known?

Neglect seems to be the blogging task I'm best at. I'm not even going to tease you with promises of more posting. But I do *want* to post here more often. I've been getting back to my domestic roots lately and looking for somewhere to talk about it.

So you just might be seeing more of me around here soon!

The aftermath

Who knew one little grape vine could produce so many grapes? Not me, that's for sure. Prior to this summer my grape knowledge was some-what limited. I knew they grew on vines. I certainly didn't sign on for grapes. When we realized that the vine on our fence was a concord grape vine I thought "Oh fun, we'll have a few fresh grapes to eat."
Fast forward to harvest time, and we spend 2 days picking grapes off that one little vine and end up with 6 huge paper bags full of grapes.
It took me 4 days to work through them all but I finally wrapped it up last night.14 pints of juice, 14 various sized jars of grape jelly.

Do you want to know something interesting about grapes? They stain.
Which is pretty frustrating if you have 50 year old white countertops.

Although as I was scrubbing my countertops one more time with bleach I couldn't help but think of how many other women throughout the history of my little house have done that same thing. Picked the grapes from that same vine, which is as old as the house, 64 years, and worked their way through them. Then cleaned up the aftermath and spent weeks hoping the purple would eventually come out. At that moment, wearing my favorite vintage inspired apron, dancing around my kitchen to the musical stylings of The Streets my nose burning with the smell of bleach, I was overcome with such joy. I love my life. This, right here, right now is all I have ever wanted. To be a mom and a wife. To have a house and a family to take care of. I am so blessed. It's rare to get exactly what you want out of life and I got that very thing and more.

Now onto the white grape vine.......

Trips and Projects or what I did on my summer vacation

First a confession.
I suffer from debilitating motion sickness. This makes things like roller coasters and those swings that fly around in circles out of the question for me. It also means road trips are something straight out of a Stephen King novel in my mind. Needless to say, I don't much enjoy traveling, and I wish I did. The open road, endless possibilities, it all seems so romantic.
I've learned a few tricks to help keep my head from spinning and my stomach from flip flopping around. I have to be well fed and hydrated and I must stay cool. It also helps if I have something else to focus on. Also certain cars tend to make me sicker than others. For instance I cannot ride in a Jeep Liberty for any length of time without wanting to die.
I have also found knitting to be a good thing to occupy my mind with while riding in the car, as well as hand sewing.
Summer of '08 will probably go down in history as the most boring summer ever for our family. Ben didn't have much time off work and since we just bought a house in April all spare change has gone into remodeling and updating it, with very little left over for family trips. I dare say we've enjoyed ourselves despite these things. The kids and I have had Sponge Bob Monopoly tournements and they have been such good sports as I've tried to find different ways to dress up sandwiches, their lunch of choice. However we felt the need to do something summerish. So we packed the Durango and headed South to our home town. We spent a few days with Ben's family. Playing in the water, watching the Olympics, and eating. Oh boy do we eat down there.
Good times were had all around.
Of course, we couldn't leave Nephi without another project. Apricots, which within a few days we had turned into 4 batches of jam and 6 pints of apricots in nectar. These will certainly make the winter months more enjoyable.
Stay tuned as next week we dive into Homeschooling! :)

I'd like to introduce you....

To my lovely Sister in law, April.

http://jakeandapril.blogspot.com/

April is married to Ben's younger (but not littler) brother Jacob and they have 2 adorable kids. Brenden is just a month younger than Sophia and Tijah is coming up on a year in November. This is a picture I took of Sophia and Brenden a week or so ago.

Oh the adventures we've had together. I have to admit, I really love watching Ben and Jacob together. It's very easy to imagine them as little boys, chasing each other around playing, taking things apart and risking their lives every chance they got. Recently we went to an amusement park together and watching those two men racing each other up the stairs to the water slide sent my mind spinning with images of what it must have been like growing up in the Menlove house.

I only wish they lived closer.